Fuel-injected in Florida

A family vacation can only entertain me for so long before I need to go flying
again. Fortunately I had arranged to go flying with an instructor while on
vacation in central Florida. For some reason or another I found an instructor
foolish enough to go up with me for a couple hours out of Sun State
Aviation.

The night before my flight, I ended up closing out Disney World with my niece,
getting into bed near one in the morning. With an early flight in the morning,
this might have been a poor decision on my part. Whatever drowsiness I woke up
with was gone by the time I stepped out into the heat.

When I met with my instructor-for-a-day we reviewed a bit of my background,
what I’m used to, the aircraft I’ve been flying and what we wanted to
accomplish in our mission for the day. As much fun as a pleasure flight would
have been, it was important to keep working on the fundamentals from my
previous few flights.

We set out to depart from Kissimmee Gateway
Airport (KISM) and head down to Winter Haven’s
Gilbert Airport (KGIF) to do some pattern work.
As I walked out onto the tarmac to pre-flight N452MK, a whole different Cessna
172SP than I’m accustomed to was waiting for me. Instead of 3 fuel sumps, 452MK
had 13 (5 each wing, 3 in the belly). In place of a primer, carburetor and carb heat,
this 452MK had a fuel injection system which I’ve never used before. The panel
layout was different, the engine idle speed was different, the trim was
different, everything was just different.

Pre-flight took longer than it usually does back in Hayward, but after we got
underway, I made the call-up to ground and we started putting along towards the
run-up area for runway 15.

A combination of both airspace, KISM sits under Orlando International’s (KMCO) Class
Bravo airspace, and lower clouds kept us cruising at about 1500ft, give or take
a 100 feet student pilot buffer. A few miles out from I make the call on Winter
Haven radio that we’re in-bound. Like my flying in
Tracy, Winter Haven is an
uncontrolled airport meaning all radio calls and locations are to be
self-announced.

Approaching the field, I decide to let my instructor perform the radio calls
for me in order to focus on my pattern and approach work. All the while keeping
in mind that I’m sweating bullets, and not entirely because of the humidity and
heat.

First approach on runway 23 and I’m higher than I want and not really where I
want to be, I decide to go-around. Without my usual instructor in the plane,
I’m finding myself much more conservative with my comfort zone.

Circuit number two is looking better, I get my mental checklist processed
properly on the base leg of the pattern (where’s the carb heat in this thing!)
and execute an adequate landing. Certainly nothing to brag about, but I made
it onto the runway without scaring the hell out of the poor sap who agreed to
instruct me for the day.

We’re cruising down the runway and he’s urging me to make certain taxiways
which I think I’m too fast to make, so generous braking must be applied. In the
ugly Duckling, the brakes have had issues on a number of our missions so I’m
terribly reluctant to use my brakes. The brakes in 452MK were definitely
functional, and wouldn’t lock up nearly as easily as the Duckling’s.

We taxi off the runway and taxi back over to the start of 23. This plane’s high
engine idle RPM means taxiing faster than I’m used to and braking far more than
I’m accustommed to.

Lining up for take-off and everything is looking good, flaps up, mixture rich,
trim set for take-off. Max power, liberal application of right rudder and we’re
accelerating down the runway. This plane springs into the air,
SSSSQUEEEERRRRRRRRRNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN, the stall warning horn goes off,
I lower the nose and we gain some airspeed and continue our climb.

“The stall warning horn on take-off is undesirable” quips the right seat. Well “no shit” I think quietly to myself

We enter the pattern again and diagnose why we leapt off the runway. Turns
out the “take-off trim” setting in this aircraft lifts the nose up in quite an
undesirable manner, combined with the back-pressure from one sweaty student
pilot, and it’s no mystery why the stall warning horn went off.

Second approach is looking good, coming in a bit high (a recurring problem for
me), bit of a forward slip to tear off some height, final round-out is decent, sqqquuueeeerrnnn goes the stall warning
horn and we touch down. Not a bad landing! Except for being halfway down the
runway.

Power settings, I will conquer you.

On the next take-off, I set the trim a bit more nose-down and get the
post-rotation lift I’m more comfortable with. Another adequate, not great, not
bad landing and we’re wrapped up at KGIF and it’s time to head back out to
Kissimmee. The time cruising between the airports gives us the opportunity to
discuss some of my rudder deficiencies in counter-acting left-turning and
right-turning tendencies. He even suggested and demonstrated an exercise he
uses to help his students.

As we closed back in on KISM’s airspace, I resumed control of the radio and
entered the pattern for landing. In unfamiliar surroundings, my ground references
for the rectangular track of the pattern are gone. As a result I rolled out on my
final approach far too early and “dragged it in.” Descending towards the
runway, close to my flare some cross-wind pushes us to the left of centerline
(nooo!) and my drift correction was insufficient such that my instructor jumped
onto the controls and drifted us right back onto centerline just as the
right wheel touched down.

We taxi back to parking, go shutdown the plane and push it into it’s parking
spot and head inside.

Overall, the experience was definitely worth the effort and stress of the
lesson. With so many new things thrown in front of me, I was certainly
challenged on a number of levels. I think I’m far enough along in my flight
training to be able to identify some of my own problems I’m having in the
pattern. Whether it’s power settings, too high of a round-out over the runway,
too much speed carried into the flare, etc. In a number of the cases, my
instructor was silent, and I was calling out the faults from my previous run,
with occasional suggestions from the right seat. To his credit, he also refused
to answer some of my stupider questions during the flight. I would ask “figure
I should do X?” to which he’d respond with “you’re in control, it’s your call.”
Annoying in the moment, but I think it’s the right call the make as an
instructor, because as I move forward, it is my call and I need to make the
decisions and learn for myself. To a certain extent, the instructor is a safety
net for those decisions, but the judgement call should be mine to make more
often than not.

Having lost some water and wallet-weight over the preceeding 2 hours, I thanked
my instructor for going up with such an unknown like me, a remote student who’s
in town for the week, and headed back to the house.

The 20 minute drive was just about enough time to mentally review the flight,
assess what I did well, what I didn’t do well and what I should work on next
flight.

I can now highly recommend flying while on vacation, especially if you can
manage to turn it into another training opportunity and learn something new.